It has been proposed that for ecotourism to be the sustainable response to mass tourism, it should not only support local communities and their environments but also educate visitors. This study aimed to understand visitors' perceptions of personal impacts, including personal learning, in an ecotourism setting and why these impacts differed between visitors. To fully comprehend the nature of personal impacts, I took a primarily qualitative approach, using participant observation and a series of survey questionnaires. This study reveals that the visitor's construction of personal meaning is achieved through the interaction between the visitor's prior knowledge, quality social interaction on the tour and the fulfillment of the desire for an 'authentic' experience. With this finding, I suggest considering learning in an ecotourism setting as personal change and provide practical suggestions for encouraging all visitors to achieve personal understanding. / Master of Science / The Village Ecotourism Network (JED) in Bali, Indonesia is an ecotourism operation that provides tours of local Balinese villages to visitors. JED aims to promote sustainable tourism in Bali and counteract the growth of mass tourism currently occurring on the island. In this study, I focused on the visitor’s experience during these tours and sought to answer two questions:
1. What outcomes do visitors achieve on JED programs?
2. Why are these outcomes different for different visitors?
To understand the visitor experience, I accompanied the visitors during their tour, recorded my observations of the experience and asked visitors to fill out survey questionnaires. After compiling and analyzing the data, I found that visitor outcomes derive from the interaction between the visitor’s prior knowledge before the tour began, quality social interactions during the tour and the fulfillment of visitors’ desire to experience ‘authentic’ Bali.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:VTETD/oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/77576 |
| Date | 02 May 2017 |
| Creators | Hoffman, Brittany |
| Contributors | Forest Resources and Environmental Conservation, Stern, Marc J., McGehee, Nancy G., Glasson, George E. |
| Publisher | Virginia Tech |
| Source Sets | Virginia Tech Theses and Dissertation |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Format | ETD, application/pdf |
| Rights | In Copyright, http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/ |
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